The Empire Strikes Back: Digital Control of Unfair Terms of Online Services

The authors argue that it is possible to partly automate the process of abstract control of fairness of clauses in online consumer contracts. The authors present a theoretical and empirical argument for this claim, including a brief presentation of the software they have designed. This type of automation would not replace human lawyers but would assist them and make their work more effective and efficient. Policy makers should direct their attention to the potential of using algorithmic techniques in enforcing the law regarding unfair contractual terms, and to facilitating research on and ultimately implementing such technologies.     

Ethical Reasoning in Action: Validity Evidence for the Ethical Reasoning Identification Test (ERIT)

In recent years, a growing number of small-to-medium-enterprises are embracing wind turbine projects not only as part of their cost reduction strategy but also to actively play their part in the global fight against climate change. However, it would appear there are currently limited empirical studies carried out in this emerging industry. This case study analyses the cost effectiveness of one such wind turbine initiative by a company in the Republic of Ireland, who invested in a 300 kW embedded wind turbine project at the end of 2013. The research methodology which is primarily a case study analysis included comparing historical electricity utility bills which allowed the 2013 quantity of electrical energy units imported, i.e. the year before the turbine was installed to be compared with the 2014 value, i.e. the year after the turbine was installed. Numerous site visits were undertaken over a four-year period, during which electric meter readings were recorded and stored. The findings of this piece of research indicate that the installation of the embedded wind turbine had minimal positive effect on the annual electricity costs for the company. Indeed the turbine appears to have significant negative effects such as a need for an increased maximum import capacity and also it appeared to contribute to a deteriorating utility power factor. While the aesthetic nature of the on-site turbine seemed to create a positive image of the company, it would appear that caution should be exercised when business owners select alternative energy providers who claim to be experts in the energy field but may have limited knowledge in this area of wind energy, which as of yet has minimal robust research into all aspects of its benefits/attributes.     

Consumer Responses to the Food Industry’s Proactive and Passive Environmental CSR,Factoring in Price as CSR Tradeoff

This study explores social enterprises’ strategies for addressing mission drift. Relying on an inductive comparative case study of two Italian social enterprises, we show how stakeholder engagement combined with social accounting can successfully support a social venture to re-balance its positioning between wealth generation and social value creation. Indeed, stakeholder engagement helps the internal actors of a social enterprise to rationalize and embody pro-social values previously abandoned, while social accounting reinforces this embodiment process by showing the reintroduced social commitment of the social enterprise to external audiences. Conversely, strategies focused only on social accounting and without significant engagement of external stakeholders prove to be unsuccessful in counterbalancing mission drift because they fail to activate the necessary process of internal re-introduction and operationalization of pro-social values and objectives.     

Models of Congruence of Personal and Organizational Values: How Many Points of Contact are There Between Science and Practice?

The paper aims to analyse the structure of the formed models of congruence of personal and organizational values, opportunities of their application in order to conceptualize the guidelines for the formation of an integrated model. The models for analysis were selected from the articles published in international databases with the keywords associated with value congruence models and grouped by the types of models: models that represent the origin of the phenomenon of value congruence and methodology of evaluation, and models, which depict the impact of value congruence on the employee and activities of the organization. The main result of this research is a complex analysis of all models of congruence of personal and organizational values presented in the scientific literature, in the aspect of their structure, content and practical application. It was found that the essential elements of the models analysed are personal values, organizational values, congruence of personal and organizational values and the influence of congruence on the person and the organization. However, the models lack not only the scientific substantiation of the influence of the phenomenon of value congruence on the person and the organization, but also practical recommendations on how to achieve strong value congruence in the organization. This article exclusively presents the analysis of models developed by different scientists, but the obtained results of empirical studies are not compared statistically, applying certain models in practice. Such criteria as the sample size, the nature of activities of the organizations were not analysed and the states, in which the studies were carried out with the application of the analysed models, are not emphasized. This study also does not aim to determine the most appropriate diagnostic instrument for evaluation of value congruence, leaving the open way for the further discussions. The originality of this research is presupposed by the fact that it presents most of the models described in the scientific literature that evaluate the congruence of personal values of employees and the values prevailing in the organization. This will help the researchers of value congruence form a clear view about the models published in scientific literature, not to be disorientated in the diversity of the presented models and look for new directions for improvement of models of value congruence. A newly developed complex model of value congruence also offered to executives of organizations will help perceive the process of formation of this phenomenon and its benefits, and understand how to manage this phenomenon in practice.     

Contextualizing Corporate Political Responsibilities: Neoliberal CSR in Historical Perspective

This article provides a historical contextualization of Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) and its political role. CSR, we propose, is one form of business–society interactions reflecting a unique ideological framing. To make that argument, we compare contemporary CSR with two historical ideal-types. We explore in turn paternalism in nineteenth century Europe and managerial trusteeship in early twentieth century US. We outline how the political responsibilities of business were constructed, negotiated, and practiced in both cases. This historical contextualization shows that the frontier between economy and polity has always been blurry and shifting and that firms have played a political role for a very long time. It also allows us to show how the nature, extent, and impact of that political role changed through history and co-evolved in particular with shifts in dominant ideologies. Globalization, in that context, is not the driver of the political role of the firm but a moderating phenomenon contributing significantly to the dynamics of this shift. The comparison between paternalism, trusteeship, and contemporary CSR points to what can be seen as functional equivalents—alternative patterns of business–society interactions that each correspond, historically, to unique and distinct ideological frames. We conclude by drawing implications for future theorizing on (political) CSR and stakeholder democracy.     

You May Not Reap What You Sow: How Employees’ Moral Awareness Minimizes Ethical Leadership’s Positive Impact on Workplace Deviance

Although a growing body of research has shown the positive impact of ethical leadership on workplace deviance, questions remain as to whether its benefits are consistent across all situations. In this investigation, we explore an important boundary condition of ethical leadership by exploring how employees’ moral awareness may lessen the need for ethical leadership. Drawing on substitutes for leadership theory, we suggest that when individuals already possess a heightened level of moral awareness, ethical leadership’s role in reducing deviant actions may be reduced. However, when individuals lack this strong moral disposition, ethical leadership may be instrumental in inspiring them to reduce their deviant actions. To enhance the external validity and generalizability of our findings, the current research used two large field samples of working professionals in both Turkey and the USA. Results suggest that ethical leadership’s positive influence on workplace deviance is dependent upon the individual’s moral awareness—helpful for those employees whose moral awareness is low, but not high. Thus, our investigation helps to build theory around the contingencies of ethical leadership and the specific audience for whom it may be more (or less) influential.     

Understanding Firms’ Approaches to Voluntary Certification: Evidence from Multiple Case Studies in FSC Certification

Voluntary certifications, such as Forestry Stewardship Council (FSC) in the forestry sector, are used to manage sustainable and socially responsible practices in firms. Even though the certifications are based on standards, it has been reported that adopting firms are nothing but a homogeneous cohort of adopters and in fact differ in their approaches to the certification. In this paper, we conceptualize firms’ approach to certification and link the approaches to various aspects of certification. Using an inductive approach and deriving our data from multiple case studies from forestry FSC certification, we argue that firms’ approach to certification is explained by their development of absorptive capacity, alignment of their organizational routines and their engagement in negotiations with FSC. We also argue that these approaches affect firm’s benefits from certification, their level of adherence to the requirements of the certification and their likelihood to withdraw from the certification. We discuss our findings in view of the literature on absorptive capacity, institutional literature and the literature on collective action and also discuss the implications of the study to voluntary certification literature in general.     

Parents’ performance in entrepreneurship as a “double-edged sword” for the intergenerational transmission of entrepreneurship

We investigate how perceived parents’ performance in entrepreneurship (PPE) affects the entrepreneurial career intentions of offspring. We argue that while perceived PPE enhances offspring’s perceived entrepreneurial desirability and feasibility because of exposure mechanisms, it inhibits the translation of both desirability and feasibility perceptions into entrepreneurial career intentions due to upward social comparison mechanisms. Thus, perceived PPE acts as a double-edged sword for the intergenerational transmission of entrepreneurship. Our predictions are tested and confirmed on a sample of 21,895 individuals from 33 countries. This study advances the literature on intergenerational transmission of entrepreneurship by providing a foundation for understanding the social psychological conditions necessary for such transmission to occur.